


Rare Items

by nehemiah



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Awkward Romance, F/M, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 21:18:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19472404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nehemiah/pseuds/nehemiah
Summary: standard-issue JB modern AU. there will be fluff, there will be moderate angst, there will be some filth. cliches are good, actually.





	1. Chapter 1

Brienne appreciates routine.

Sometimes she wonders if she’s a boring person. In her forgiving moods she tells herself it’s understandable given the amount of upheaval she’s had to cope with in her life. She’s been living in the city for almost a year now, she’s been working at the Central Library for five months, she has a pleasant little flat (there’s a river view, the letting agent had told her: there is, kind of, if you crane your neck and stand on tiptoes - or if you’re extremely tall, so, well, that turned out okay). She finally feels like there’s some stability in her life.

Two other library assistants started at the same time as Brienne and she soon fell in with them, although she’s a few years older (she’s had a slightly bumpier career path). Sansa is sweet and under her cool exterior a bit of a romantic, impossibly patient with problem customers. Shireen is whip-smart and observant and hungry to learn and to share, always the first to volunteer for training or attend seminars and run workshops and everything else under the sun. It’s not long before they start taking their lunch breaks together at the café across the road.

Not always possible, of course, rotas are rotas, sometimes there’s only two of them in, sometimes Brienne’s on her own, but even on those days, going in alone with a book to read, she feels somehow more connected, more part of something. Every day Rodrik descends from the third floor to cover the desk, grumbling about being torn away from his work. ‘If he had his way we wouldn’t let in customers at all,’ Brienne offers one day, to warm laughter.

Friends? Not quite, not yet, but the closest thing she has here _. Or anywhere._ It’s routine, it’s human, and Brienne appreciates it.

When the subject of _relationships_ comes up Brienne generally leans out of the conversation, pawing through a magazine or people-watching as Sansa talks about her latest crush or Shireen describes a terrible dating app experience. The first exception being the brief interlude with _he-who-will-not-be-named_ , the reason behind the only time Brienne ever called in sick, the reason she scowls every time she sees a bunch of roses.

The second exception being today.

‘Um,’ she says quietly, ‘I’m seeing someone new.’

Sansa and Shireen blink, then break out into matching conspiratorial grins. Brienne tries to field their questions with patience and good humour. Where did you meet? _The gym_. What was he like? _Insufferable._ What does he do? _You wouldn’t believe me if I told you_. What does he look like? _You wouldn’t believe that either_.

What’s his name? _Jaime. His name’s Jaime._


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> enter the BASTARD

Brienne’s gym is a ten minute walk from her building, she’s been coming for a few months and thinks it’s working out okay. She’s a creature of habit and always goes in at the same time in the morning, and she comes to recognise the other regulars. One in particular, a tall thirtyish blond guy with a jawline that would have had Robespierre rubbing his hands in eagerness.

_Beautiful_ , she thinks, _and doesn’t he know it?_ He preens, he grins, he tosses his hair, he winks. Today he’s with another blond guy, there’s a resemblance but the other one’s bearded, a bit stockier, more ordinary looking. A relative, a brother, maybe? They’re talking overly loudly about the brother’s girlfriend and saying some things that, well, they probably wouldn’t say them if she was here, or maybe they would.

_He’s a total prick_ , she thinks.

The bearded guy departs, the total prick works out alone for a while, then when he’s done he strips off his shirt right there at his station before he heads for the showers. _That’s against the gym rules_ , she thinks vaguely, _no shirt equals no service, jesus, that’s a body, his routine must be more serious than I thought, why I do feel like I’ve seen it before?_ She catches herself staring and looks away, but not before one of the gym staff, a tall brunette, catches Brienne’s eye and blows her cheeks out and tugs at her collar.

_Imagine getting that, everywhere you go_ , she thinks. _Imagine what that would do to your ego._

That lunchtime she’s looking at a magazine when she sees a black-and-white swimwear advert and chokes, splurting coffee all over the page. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ she mutters, it’s Shireen’s magazine, not hers, ‘it’ll wipe right off, look,’ then in her fumbling with a napkin she knocks her whole coffee cup over, and Shireen and Sansa both dissolve into hysterics.

Brienne laughs too, but most of her brain is dedicated to processing the realisation that _it’s him, the total prick, that’s why he was familiar, he models, he’s in a swimwear advert, it’s him._ For the next few weeks she tries particularly hard to ignore him.

Until one Tuesday. It’s _that joyful joyful time of the month_ , Brienne is pained and tense and irritable, and thinks a hard workout might bring some relief. She heads straight to a rowing machine, ratchets up the resistance, slams her body back and forth, yanks at the paddles like she has a personal grudge against them, takes satisfaction in hearing the clanking and groaning of the machinery. But it doesn’t have the desired effect. When she has to stop, she feels pained, tense, irritable, _and_ tired, _and_ sweaty. She takes out her hairband and sighs.

Slowly she becomes aware that someone’s staring at her. She’s used to that. Being six feet four and fifteen stone and _really fucking ugly_ seems to attract people’s attention, who’d have imagined it, most of the time she lets it slide but today, today, she’s feeling pissed off. She rises to her feet and strides across the room.

Interventions like this usually go one of two ways. Either the guy looks away and mumbles some non-apology then goes back to staring as soon as he thinks her back is turned. _Or_ , he gets a flash of bravado, reaches for something insulting to say, and Brienne’s left with the uncomfortable choice of escalating and making a scene in public, or storming off and letting him get the last laugh.

Today the starer is – surprise surprise – the total prick.

He doesn’t look away as she approaches, just sits there with his water bottle halfway to his lips, at _least he’s not got that smirk on today, all the same, I think we’ve got a type 2 here, wonderful, he’s going to be really glib and throw in some taunts and provoke me to anger and I’ll end up getting my membership taken away-_

She clenches her fists by her sides.

‘Pardon me,’ she says in the calmest tones she can muster. ‘You were staring. It was making me uncomfortable.’ _Come on, don’t be so polite, take it up a gear_. ‘I’m not a fucking zoo animal.’

‘No,’ he agrees. ‘I’m sorry, I couldn’t help-‘ He does break into a grin now, probably his attempt to turn on the charm, perhaps little knowing it’s going to have about the same impact as a fly has on the windscreen of an articulated lorry. ‘Just… seeing you in full flow like that, it was… impressive.’

_Novel response, at least_. ‘That’s as may be,’ she says warily. ‘All the same, I don’t come here to be gawked at. Do you think you could concentrate on your own workout?’

He thinks he can. She lets it go. She heads for the exit. She doesn’t have to be at work for another hour, she can lie down with a hot water bottle for a while and see if that improves matters.

Curiously, over the next week, the total prick is as good as his word _. Almost as if we had a disagreement and resolved it like adults_ , she thinks. _Whatever next?_


	3. Chapter 3

He doesn’t stare at her again. But he _does_ look over at her. A lot. He makes a point of doing it. And he _does_ smile, and he is free and easy with winks and nods, and sympathetic looks when a gym patron nearby says something objectionable…

For all her limited experience, Brienne wasn’t blind and she wasn’t stupid, and she feels the realisation slowly crystallise: _the total prick is flirting with you._ She has to turn that around in her head a few hundred times before she can begin to understand the significance of it. She’s sleepless in bed that night and a too-familiar internal dialogue kicks in.

 _It’s some joke at your expense,_ says the voice of doubt _. He’s trying to draw you out so he can humiliate you. He’s bitter about the way you confronted him._

 _Lot of trouble to go to,_ says the voice of hope _. If he wanted to embarrass us why didn’t he say something rude at the time?_

 _What’s the premise here?_ demands the voice of doubt. _That **he** is into **you**?_

 _Maybe he likes fitness girls_ , says the voice of hope.

 _Maybe, but there’s fitness girls and fitness girls_ , retorts the voice of doubt. _Nobody’s about to offer **you** a swimwear contract._

The voice of doubt has all the smugness of someone who’s been proved right time and time again.

The voice of hope has all the stubbornness of someone who refuses to be silenced all the same.

Brienne pulls herselves together and decides, just for science’s sake, just to know, just to be _sure_ , that she needs to flirt back at him.

She starts small. She returns his smiles. Her smile is nothing to write home about, she knows her teeth are crooked and off-colour, but he seems gratified rather than repulsed. She starts calling out to him in the morning, giving him a wave. _Normal, completely normal, just two people being nice to each other, it’s what this city needs more of._ _Normal._ She realises she can’t think of him as ‘the total prick’ anymore. One day, she passes his bench and quietly says ‘good set,’ and he looks like his day’s been made, and it’s not even eight in the morning yet.

She sits at the repair desk later that day, contemplating smashing herself over the head with the nearest heavy object (a 1938 OUP edition of Butler’s _Lives of the Saints_ , 378 pp, slight binding damage). _‘Good set’, incredible flirting, the kind of thing emotionally constipated gym bros say to each other, I bet he’s picking out an engagement ring right now. Good set!_

She decides that it’s time to send some unmistakable signals.

She’s never worn makeup to the gym before. Pointless, she’s always said, if you’re doing any kind of real work in there. _Pointless for you anyway, you can’t polish a t_ \- she bites that thought off, she had a few sessions of CBT once, the one thing that’s stuck is that she shouldn’t put herself down so much. At the time she’d sat with arms folded, looking away from the therapist, and asked in a small voice why she should be the only person left out of the fun.

Now, now, she remembers Dad’s latest girlfriend sent her a makeup advent calendar last Christmas, probably her idea of a subtle hint, wasn’t there a ‘miracle’ runproof eyeliner behind one of the windows? She finds it in the box of junk under her bed, she reads the description and says ‘we’ll see.’ Her eyes are the only part of her that ever attract compliments, and she can't even take satisfaction in that because she always hears the unspoken second half of the sentence. Nice eyes. Nice eyes, _shame about the rest_. She draws it on patiently.

Unmistakable signal: she wears a cropped workout top that reveals a _lot_ of midriff.

Brienne thinks her midriff is nothing to write home about either. She works her core, of course, but isn’t too worried about _definition._ Better to be strong than just look strong, she’s always said, so her waist is thick and as pale and freckled as the rest of her, and she hasn’t waxed since last summer so there’s a trail of fine blonde hairs leading down from her navel, but-

‘But nothing,’ she says out loud, into the mirror. ‘This is the package. Take it or leave it.’

It’s busier on a Saturday, but he’s there, a face in the crowd, _good start_ , all her favourite machines are taken, she settles for a treadmill. It’s one of the older ones, tucked in the corner at a right angle to the rest of the room. Ten minutes later, pounding away, she thinks she must have developed ESP, because once again she knows someone’s staring at her, but this time she knows it’s _him_ , and most bizarrely of all, she knows he’s trying not to stare, but failing.

Suddenly she feels queasy and exposed, she stops the program, she gathers her things, she wishes he hadn’t worn the stupid crop top, _I’ll call it a day, I’ll catch up tomorrow, maybe I’ll just have a quiet –_ but she’s not even gone through the big automatic doors at reception when she hears someone calling her.

It _is_ him, jogging, he’s _jogging_ to catch up with her. He looks… confused?

‘Hey,’ he says breathlessly, stopping arm’s length away.

‘Oh. Hello.’ Beyond that simple acknowledgement she isn’t sure what else to say. ‘Yes?’

‘You’re leaving already?’ he manages.

‘Um, yes,’ she lies, feeling the ground falling away under her feet, ‘I, I wasn’t feeling too good.’

‘We were never really introduced,’ he says finally. ‘I’m Jaime.’

‘Brienne,’ she offers.

‘I just wanted – I wondered-‘

He stammers on, never taking his eyes off her, and Brienne gets flustered and looks down, she finds herself looking at his shorts, _weird, they’re all bunched up there, I wonder what_ – then she realises what she’s looking at, and she realises that she’s staring at it, and she jerks her eyes back up to meet his.

They share a look that’s complicated, but also very, very, simple.

Ten minutes later they’re all over each other in the hallway of her building, she’s praying that none of her neighbours come out, _well this is unexpected, the launderette will have to wait-_

‘You wore that for me, didn’t you,’ he growls, his face in her neck as she fumbles with the door keys, ‘you play all coy but you’re filthy, you want it, I knew it, you want it-‘

‘Don’t flatter yourself,’ she hisses in the hall, ‘I’ve known men like you, you think you’re entitled to everything just because, just because-‘ she yanks his top over his head so hard she hears a stitch tear.

‘There _are_ no men like me,’ he grunts, practically throwing her down onto her bed. She levers herself straight back up in his face, she wants to tell him what a ridiculous line that is, but as it happens her tongue’s a little occupied now.

Later, she comes to realise that they were both trying to prove something. She was thinking she’d put the arrogant little prick in his place, and doubtless he was thinking something similar, though no doubt with _big freakish bitch_ substituted, of course, it’s a fight as much as a fuck. Both of them want to go on top - they practically wrestle for it. There’s no preamble, he goes in much harder than he needs to, she knows she’s going to be sore tomorrow but she’s damned if she’s going to show any weakness, she scratches, he bites, fifty-one minutes later they’re both done, soaked and exhausted.

‘Jesus,’ she says into her pillow.

‘Again,’ gasps Jaime beside her, ‘we have to- I have to see you again.’

 _Have to_ she doesn’t like, maybe the guy has a controlling streak, or it’s just that entitlement complex again. All the same… why not? _Rude service, but overall a satisfying experience, four stars, would visit again_.

He wants to come back tomorrow. She tries to put him off until next weekend. They settle on Wednesday.


	4. Chapter 4

Brienne has to go in the next day, just her, no Shireen and no Sansa, so there’s nobody to comment on the purple weal on her neck or the fact that she’s moving around a little gingerly… which is a good thing. Of course.

 _Check me out_ , she thinks distractedly, writing out the tickets for tomorrow’s reservations, _three! Three notches on the bedpost, I’m practically a mankiller now, lock up your husbands…_

He’s coming at seven on Wednesday. She should just be able to get home in time, eat something quick, probably not time to shower and change… not that putting on nice clothes would be a good idea if it’s going to be like _that_ again.

Brienne never thought she had huge expectations from life, she's always tried to be grateful for whatever she’s given - so it’s with mild surprise that she realises that she _wants more_. On her break she climbs the stairs to the third floor, goes out on the balcony overlooking the car park, and stares out at the city. She follows the curve of the river off into the haze, where eventually, somewhere out of sight, it reaches the coast, and Evenfall, and her mind wanders in the direction of I _deserve better, I deserve some actual romance, not just the occasional fuck from a man who wants the challenge of climbing Big Brienne._

 _Deserve, deserve, deserve_ , she thinks venomously. _Listen to yourself. Who’s entitled now?_

By the time Wednesday comes around, she’s successfully smothered any excitement or anticipation, she’s taken out her phone five hundred times and _almost_ texted him something like **_can we cancel, not in the mood tonight, B_** , but she can’t decide whether to finish it with an **_x_ **or nor, _are we really in an x position?_ _And more to the point, are you really in a position to turn this down?_ She gives up and resigns herself to the situation, and that afternoon Rodrik gives her some extra work to do, because _of course,_ so she has to catch the later bus and doesn’t get home until ten past seven.

She doesn’t tell him she’s going to be late. _Maybe he’ll just leave, maybe the problem will resolve itself_ – he doesn’t, it doesn’t. He’s waiting outside her building, leaning nonchalantly against the wall, looking… well, looking like he’s made a real effort, immaculate hair, clean shaven, smart leather coat and an expensive-looking patterned shirt.

‘Sorry,’ she says vaguely. ‘I had to stay late at work. You waited?’

He shrugs and smiles. They go upstairs. She puts down her bag and strips off her jacket, indicating with a flick of the head that he can use the hooks if he wants, not just dump his things on the floor like last time.

‘Okay, let’s get to it,’ she grunts, she starts unbuttoning her work blouse, _let’s get this over with,_ but Jaime isn’t blind, he senses something’s amiss, of course he does.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asks.

‘Sorry,’ she half-lies, ‘just a tough day,’ but he surprises her by moving in for a kiss, it’s… _gentle_ , no pushing, no rushing, they stand in her kitchenette for a few minutes just _kissing_ , that’s all.

By the time they break apart her lips are a little sore and she’s feeling fairly glad she never sent that text.

They head for the bedroom, she shrugs off her skirt, there’s some more kissing, Jaime pushes her down and tonight she’s not in the mood to fight, but he surprises her again, he kneels by the edge of the bed, ‘oh,’ she says, ‘okay, if you-‘

Brienne never really liked oral. In her experience men didn’t have a clue, and when they were done sucking and slurping they acted like they’d done you some huge favour, a more unpleasantly intimate version of the guys who hold open doors and seem to want applause for it –

 _Most men,_ she corrects herself sharply, trying not to gasp out loud, **_most_** _men don’t have a clue, most, most, oh jesus, oh fucking hell he’s good what is happening here-_

He brings her to a peak and holds her there, she can’t stand it any more, she’s more than ready. ‘Get up here,’ she growls, she leans forward and bodily hauls him up by the shoulders until their eyes are level. ‘So impatient,’ he laughs and brushes his sticky lips against hers. She reaches down and guides him in, the amusement in those green eyes is replaced by hunger, they pick up where they left off last time. Halfway through she rolls on top, no objection from him tonight, she tries to feel his movements and synchronise with them, it’s uncertain at first, they metaphorically tread on each other’s feet for a while, then she gets the rhythm and his eyes widen and she starts groaning with every thrust, there’s purple flashes on the edge of her vision-

Neither of them lasts as long this time.

In the aftermath she’s lying half-stunned, spread-eagled, feet sticking out from the bed, _normal, completely normal, there’s a gorgeous blond Adonis who models for a living lying in my bed next to me, for some reason I seem to drive him crazy with lust, we’ve just had, let’s look it square in the face, the best sex of my life. Normal._

She laughs out loud, then claps a hand over her face. Jaime’s only half asleep next to her, he looks up at the sound and gives her a lazy grin.

*

_Tomorrow night? Yes, I’m free, come round, definitely._

_*_

She gets through work, somehow. She confesses at lunchtime that she's seeing someone new.

*

The following night it’s _almost_ as good, afterwards Jaime throws an arm across her, _interesting_ , but instead of an idiot grin she lies there with a pensive look, and Jaime, bless him, picks up on it. ‘Was that okay?’ he says, brow furrowed.

‘It was fine,’ she reassures him, _you’re slipping, mister, that was only the **second** best sex of my life, buck your ideas up_, ‘you were great.’

_Right. Time to do it. Time to blow apart the best physical relationship I’ve ever had._

‘Jaime… do you want this to be more than sex?’

Sure enough, he flinches away like he’s been shot by a sniper. ‘Ahm, look,’ he begins, ‘being with you is great and all, but things are a little messy for me right now-‘

Brienne closes her eyes. _It’s not that simple. It’s complicated. That kind of commitment is hard for me. Can’t we just keep things casual?_ She doesn’t have vast experience with relationships, but there are some songs you learn very quickly.

‘Never mind,’ she mutters and turns away.

‘I’m divorced,’ Jaime announces to her back. ‘I’m _going through_ a divorce,’ he corrects himself. ‘I have two kids. School age. My job – I know you recognised me, by the way – my job requires a lot of travel, I’m away as much as I’m home.’

She half-turns back to him. ‘How does that work with the two kids?’ she demands.

Jaime sighs and puts a hand to his head. ‘God knows. When I get full custody… god knows how I’m going to make it work.’

‘Alright,’ she says grudgingly, after thinking about it. ‘That’s messy.’

They lie in silence for a while. Brienne feels she needs to add something. ‘I work in a library and I have a few houseplants,’ she says, and she laughs, and he joins in.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> first date.

They’ve agreed to a date. A real date, with talking and everything.

It’s half past seven in the morning and they’re both skipping the gym to be here. Morning dates are one of Brienne’s little life hacks. She thinks they’ll weed out people who aren’t motivated enough to make an effort, or who can’t be sociable without a skinful of alcohol.

She thinks about another date, one in her first year, at some student bar. He turned up, waved to friends in a corner booth, waved to friends at the pool table ( _wow_ , she’d thought, so young, _this_ _must be some guy_ ), took his seat opposite her almost as an afterthought. She’d tried so hard to make herself pretty, send positive signals, take an interest in everything he said, just like the magazines said, and she tried in vain to detect some signal coming back the other way.

He did make it clear in the end, because at some point, without having said anything, without anything being officially declared, after taking longer and longer trips away from their table, _he_ was sitting with his friends and _she_ was sitting alone, and she stayed there until her embarrassment finally overcame her stubbornness and she slunk home, with her badly applied makeup running and-

The jingling of the café door jolts her back into the present, he’s here, he’s not even fashionably late. At first it doesn’t go too well. The chat is dry and desultory. Brienne soon finds herself staring down into her cup, picking at the rim with the fingernails. _Still, you haven’t ogled his crotch yet, Bri, so that’s progress._

‘I’ve never really dated,’ says Jaime into the silence. ‘It all seems a bit fake, doesn’t it?’

Not exactly a groundbreaking view, she thinks, but she’s pleased to hear him say it, she smiles and agrees. ‘I’ve not dated much either.’ _Okay, little too much honesty there, never mind though, like grandmother would say, no point being coy around someone after you’ve screwed his brains out three times._

(Brienne never knew either of her grandmothers, but having no real memories of a person can be liberating. She’s been free to construct her own imaginary grandmother, full of salty wisdom and down-to-earth advice for times like these.)

(Brienne sometimes wonders if she spent too much time alone as a child.)

‘It’s like we’re on one of those cheesy TV shows,’ Jaime goes on. His voice shifts into a Cro-Magnon grunt. _‘I’m Troy, I love the beach and the gym, I’m looking for someone who won’t screw me around.’_

‘That’s what we should do,’ she laughs. ‘Like those little introduction clips they do for each new contestant.’

He likes that idea. He shifts across their table so his back’s against the wall, he leans into the _I don’t usually drink beer_ pose, he smoulders at an invisible camera. ‘Hi ladies,’ he says, flashing a smile that must have sold a thousand wristwatches. ‘I’m Jaime, and I’m looking for love.’

‘Tell us a little about yourself, Jaime,’ she supplies.

‘Well, I’m 36. I was born and raised right here in the city. Ahm, I allegedly have a brother, he’s abroad so much I sometimes wonder whether I dreamed him, I went to Casterly (Brienne raises an eyebrow, ‘Dad has money,’ Jaime responds sheepishly in his regular voice) and… I’m a model.’

‘Goodness, you don’t say,’ she says. ‘How did you get into that?’

‘Ahm, well, I did an MBA, but I spent a lot of time hanging around the art department, art and photography students are always looking for models, it’s a good way to earn a little extra ( _interesting_ , she thinks, _rich daddy but had to scrape up his own beer money, must find out the story behind that_ ). They said I was a natural so…’ he finishes with a shrug. ‘You have a go.’

_Right._

‘I’m Brienne, I’m 24, I’m a librarian (a library assistant, actually, but you get tired of explaining the difference, and when she says ‘librarian’ Jaime waggles his eyebrows and pantomimes fanning his face with both hands). Um, I come from Evenfall, yes, the coastal resort everyone visited on a school trip once. It’s actually very beautiful out of season, I always loved the sea – _I love the beach and the gym_ ,’ she says sarcastically, and Jaime actually claps his hands in delight.

Now he puts on a smarmy TV presenter voice – important to note, she thinks, that Jaime is already blessed with considerable reserves of smarm, when he puts on an _exaggeratedly smarmy voice_ the chart shoots off the y-axis and probably off the page altogether – and says ‘So what are you looking for in a partner, Brienne?’

She thinks she should have prepared for such an obvious question _. It’s not a job interview, well of course it kind of is_ , the fun little game suddenly feels very serious and she gets flustered. ‘I… I’m not looking for a partner.’

‘Oh?’ grins Jaime in the presenter voice ( _Greg_ , let’s say he’s called Greg). ‘Then why are you here tonight, Brienne?’

‘I’m not _looking_ for a partner,’ she clarifies hesitantly, ‘but I’m here for romance if the right person comes along.’

‘Ah, but how will you know it it’s the right person?’ oils Greg.

‘I’ll know,’ she says, with more confidence than she feels. She draws herself up, puts on an irritatingly nasal voice of her own (this must be Greg’s co-presenter, let’s call her Rhonda). ‘But Jaime. Let’s get back to you. What are you looking for in a woman?’

‘Hmmm,’ he says, rubbing his chin. ‘I’d have to think about that one. First… honesty. I want to be with someone sincere. And… someone who accepts me for what I am. But most importantly – the most important thing…’ he raises his voice enough for the neighbouring tables to hear. ‘I’d say she has to be an _absolutely filthy bitch_ , someone who flaunts herself in revealing clothing and loves getting eaten out and makes noises like-‘ mercifully he collapses into a fit of giggles before he can get more out.

Brienne doesn’t know whether to burst out laughing or scream or punch him: she compromises by grabbing a bowl of sugar cubes and throwing the contents at him. He holds his hands up against the assault and gives a mocking squeal, still with that grin on his face.

 _This is fine_ , she tells herself, not daring to look round at the room. _That was… actually pretty funny, and you started this little skit, so you can’t complain now._

‘I can’t believe you said that,’ she hisses.

‘Oh, what?’ he says dismissively. ‘You shouldn’t be so uptight, you know. It’s the twenty-first century, nobody here’s in a convent. Look.’ He raises his voice again. ‘Hey everybody,’ this time it’s loud enough for the whole café to hear, he waggles a finger between himself and Brienne. ‘WE HAVE SEX.’

The café falls silent briefly, but after a moment the conversations start again, in understandably strained tones, _I can never, ever come back here_ , she’s rigid and hunched in her seat with both hands over her mouth, he just shrugs and says ‘See? Nobody minds.’

She feels hot enough to melt the chair under her, but when her skin cools to something like normal temperature she feels able to carry on, _at least he’s broken the ice, ha ha ha,_ they talk more a little more comfortably. Favourite city? Venice. Yours? Um, well, this one, by default. Favourite writer? Norman Mailer. Yours? Rachel Carson. (Both lies, but lies with sufficient truth in them; the real answers will have to wait for now).

Brienne thinks she’s enjoying the date, but a suspicion that starts in the depths of her gut slowly deepens and spreads, and it’s something along the lines of: _You’ve been sitting with this guy for half an hour and you don’t know him any better than when you started. All he’s done is make jokes._

She wrestles with this for another seven and half minutes before it seizes control of her tongue and makes her say, more harshly than she’d like, ‘So… is there anything in your life you take seriously?’

His grin instantly vanishes, his expression turns sour. ‘Really?’ he asks. ‘ _Fun_ is what all this-‘ a vague gesture, perhaps he means _this date_ , or _romance_ , or life in general ‘-is supposed to be about.’ He looks away and chews irritably on a fingernail. ‘You want serious, date an undertaker.’

Brienne sighs and stands up, _Jesus, he’s a teenager_ , she’s about to grab her handbag and say _well I must be going, perhaps we’ll see each other around,_ when he looks up and says ‘What are you doing this weekend?’

_This weekend, don’t tell me, you want to drag me to some fucking bar and-_

‘You should come round for dinner. I want you to meet my kids.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> friends, there will be more, but don't wait up! it might be a week or two.


End file.
